Saturday, April 25, 1998

Ex-Stone Bill Wyman rolls on

Bill Wyman has no regrets about leaving the Rolling Stones.

By KAREN BLISS / Jam! Music

As Mick and the boys continue its umpteenth world tour, which includes a make-up date at Toronto's SkyDome this Sunday, the former Stones bassist is happily at home in England, doing phone interviews for his new solo album, "Struttin' Our Stuff", and awaiting the birth of his third daughter with his current wife of five years.

"I left the band because I just didn't like touring anymore," Wyman says. "I didn't want the lifestyle any more. I wanted to have a different life, and I wanted to focus on a lot of other ideas that I had, and a lot of careers because I had interest in five or six different areas, not only music -- art, archeology, astronomy, photography, restaurants, film music and production -- so it was time to move on and do all those things I hadn't been able to do properly for 30 odd years when I was in the band."

Wyman has numerous projects on the go. There's his three Sticky Fingers restaurants in Britain, said to have the "Best Burger in London"; there's a limited edition book of his photographs of artist Marc Chagall; a six-part television series on the history of the blues he's researching; the sequel to his autobiography Stone Alone for which he's just talked to a ghost writer; and a book about archeology and English history. I don't like doing music music music all the time," he says.

But the matter at hand is music.

"Struttin' Our Stuff" is the first album in a trilogy from Bill Wyman & The Rhythm Kings, an assortment of roots styles -- jump blues, swamp boogie, early rock 'n' roll, jazz, ragtime, country-blues -- featuring a number of stellar musicians such as Albert Lee, Eric Clapton, Peter Frampton and Paul Carrack.

Covering songs from all different eras, from Willie Dixon's "Down In The Bottom" to Creedence Clearwater Revival's "Green River", even the Rolling Stones "Melody" (featuring Clapton and sung by Georgie Fame and Beverly Skeete), Wyman also wrote original songs with that same vibe. "Motorvatin' Mama" is classic yester-blues and "Jitterbug Boogie" certainly does, boogie, that is.

"Suddenly, I had a reason to write a song in a certain style," Wyman explains. "I thought, maybe I should try to write a '40s jazzy blues song, like Billie Holiday might sing or Fats Waller might sing, and I started to write like that using the chord structures they used in those days, using the melody lines they used, the phrasing they used, using the slang they used in their lyrics. I'd never done that before."

When all was said and done, he and the Rhythm Kings -- Wyman on bass and vocals, vocalist Skeete, guitarist/keyboardist Terry Taylor, pianist Dave Hartley and drummer Graham Broad -- had recorded some three-albums worth of tracks.

"It was then that I sat back and thought who would be right to finish off the tracks," says Wyman. "Eric Clapton would sound great on this track or that track, the blues, so I phoned him up. I phoned up Albert Lee and said, 'I have a bunch of tracks that I think you'll be perfect for.'"

The second and third albums feature Jeff Beck, Chris Rea, ex-Stone Mick Taylor, Stones saxman Bobby Keys, plus some repeats from the first album, like Lee and Clapton.

Wyman, the first Stone to ever release solo recordings, says if he hadn't had that outlet for the 31-years he laid down the rhythm in the Stones, he would have left the band a lot earlier. Squeezing in 1974's "Monkey Grip", 1976's "Stone Alone" and 1982's "Bill Wyman", plus his Willie And The Poorboys cast, which enlisted Jimmy Page, Paul Rodgers, Kenny Jones and fellow Stone Charlie Watts, he says his solo work was unfulfilling because he always had to fit it in between his commitment to the Stones.

"It was a situation where I knew there was no room for any other songwriters, " says Wyman of Glimmer Twins, Mick and Keith. ,,Other bands tend to be more open about things like that, and our band never was like that. Mick and Keith hogged that and made it almost impossible for anybody else to even get a whisper in there, so there was no encouragement or help as there is in most bands. It was a closed door. If you were a quality musician, obviously had musical ideas, there was no way to make them work. You have no vehicle to do them, so I had to do solo recordings and movie music. Otherwise, I was frustrated."

While Wyman & The Rhythm Kings did a handful of dates in Hamburg, Amsterdam and London in October of last year, he doesn't plan on touring behind this album trilogy. "The reason I left the band was I didn't want to tour anymore," he reiterates. "Everything we'd ever aimed to do, we'd done. We were just repeating what we'd done before, maybe bigger or more money. I didn't want to do that anymore. I saw there was nothing to achieve there anymore within the band so I though I'd do something else, so I carried on. Good luck to them; we're good friends; I see them a lot, but I'm not interested in that kind of music anymore. I've moved on."

Wyman has only seen the Rolling Stones perform once since he left the group and that was in 1995.

"It wasn't that odd," he says. "I never seen the Stones onstage so it was kind of interesting that way. But it wasn't surprising 'cause I knew all the songs (laughs). I'd obviously heard in a different way than your average person in the audience would but it was okay, but I never got an sort of twinge like 'oh, I'd love to be up there or I wish I was there.' I'm not that egotistical. I don't need that adulation all the time; that's why I was always in he shadows. "I've never had thoughts about my decision, and while they often mention little things and suggestions that maybe I might come back and do something with them, I just smile and let it go (laughs)."

One of the main reasons he doesn't want to tour again is he loves waking up in the same place every day and spending time with his family.

"Five years ago, I got married to a California girl I'd known for 17 years. We just celebrated our fifth anniversary, and we've got a little girl of three, another little girl of two and got another one about to arrive any second, and it's another little girl and it's just lovely being at home and watching them grow up. "It's something I lost and missed in the '60s when I had a son born," he explains. "He was eight months old when I joined the Stones and I missed his entire childhood because I was on the road, and I've regretted it ever since, but I've had a second chance at it and I don't want to repeat my mistake and miss it all again for the pure sake of going on the road and having my ego polished."